>The difficulty in French (for me, anyway) was the incredible array
of verb
>conjugations. Then added to that was the fact that the meanings of
the
>verbs change in different tenses, and even if the general meanings
stay the
>same, different tenses and so forth can put a hugely different
conotation to
>the verb.
>
>From what I understand, the difficulty with English is the dizzying
choice
>of adjectives and adverbs to choose from. It's not too hard to
learn, but
>in the same way French verbs are ripe with meaning, an English
speaker has
>to be able to differentiate between the sometimes subtle connotative
>differences of , just for example: thin, skinny, lithe, bony, gaunt,
>haggard, delicate, lean, gangly, lanky, slender, slim, slight, etc,
etc.
>Even the large French-english dictionaries I've seen rarely have
more than 2
>or 3 french terms for each English term, but many English terms for
the same
>french term.
>
>Of course, once you learn the conjugations of the verb "to go" you
have a
>large portion of English colloquialisms in the bag . . .
>
>Just rambling in my usually incoherent linguistically curious manner
. . .
>
>Temp
>
>
What can I add?
Just that :
Each language has its difficulties and its richness.
Each language has its critics and its lovers.
Chaque langue est unique.
Each language is unique.
Francois Bruntz
Apprenti MIAGE (Universite Paris XII - IBM France)
Please visit my Epic page :
http://www.geocities.com/TimesSquare/Dungeon/2370/
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Received on Mon Jun 23 1997 - 09:35:31 UTC